Left Behind
by Kuroi-cho-tsuki-shiro
Summary: The decision that will change Hisana's life is the one that will leave her alone in this world. Hisana and Rukia Kuchiki. Beginning of Hisana x Byakuya. 41.
1. Chapter 1

You will feel neither hunger nor thirst."

That was what he had promised her. Except, she did. Certainly, it was less than she'd felt while she was alive. She only had to eat once every few weeks now and, even then, her appetite was small. But she still got hungry. And as for the baby; it never stopped crying.

It was hungry. It was thirsty. If she asked questions, people told her she was imagining things, that it was impossible, that what she felt and what the baby complained of were mere echoes of their lives: memories and not real appetites at all. But Hisana knew her own sister. In fact, she was beginning to hate her own sister.

The Seventy-Ninth district of Rukongai was a dirty, hopeless place. People fought over the space for stalls to trade their wares; they fought over narrow, overcrowded rooms to live in. Since it was locked between the Seventy-Eighth and Eightieth districts, there wasn't even space enough for slums. It was cramped. People were angry all the time, crawling over each other. Hisana had quickly lowered her expectations; she no longer sought out accommodation that appealed to her, but rather looked for rooms in buildings that were ready to collapse; places where the damp crept down the walls and the wind and rain scuttled in, or the floors were muddy and the linen used. They were the places no-one else wanted.

She had been moving from room to room, house to house, for some time now. Where she was welcomed at first, people quickly grew tired of her once they realised the child would not stop screaming. So she had taken to sleeping in doorways in recent weeks. If the owners of the houses caught her, they beat her. She had been kicked awake four times in the last week, and now she was in yet another doorway. The men inside were drunk on sake and their hollering frightened her, but at least they were intoxicated enough not to hear the little girl's cries:

"Please shut up," Hisana said. Her voice was dull. She'd set the baby down on the doorstep beside her; it balled its fists and choked on its own despair. "I didn't ask to be here, you know, any more than you did, and if you'd just lived a minute more, just a minute, they'd have sent you somewhere else, away from me, and we'd never have had to see each other again. What would you have done then? What would you have done without me?" The girl kept on squawling, her face squashed and ugly. "Someone would have found you," Hisana said, resting her chin on her knees: "There's people here like there are back home. People love children. I'm not your mum. I'm not old enough. It's not fair. Someone else would have found you and you'd have been fine."

She'd thought it many times, but had never said it aloud. Now, the words hung in the air, gathering a strange charm.

Everyone who came to Rukongai came alone. If families existed at all, they were usually little more than clusters of like-minded souls. Women who had been mothers when they lived, in death consoled themselves by adopting the children who came orphaned into the afterlife. Dead or alive, people craved company and a sense of belonging.

Hisana stared down at her sister. Try as she might, she couldn't love that tiny, screeching bundle. She had brought her this far, but only out of duty, and what was duty in this world? She'd had a home once, a family and a future. The meaninglessness of this world never ceased to surprise her. So where were her loyalties meant to lie now? To the death gods who had brought her here? To the baby at her side? Or to herself?

Someone would love the child.

Before she could change her mind, she scooped it up and began to walk down the road.

Upon entry into Soul Society, each spirit was assigned a district. There were eighty in Rukongai and Hisana and her sister had been registered with Seventy-Ninth. Souls were expected to remain in their districts unless they found employment without or married into a different region. Soul-reapers manned the checkpoints around the city and it was while passing one of these that the child suddenly fell silent.

Hisana didn't know the area. She had been walking blindly, trying to get up the courage to do what she knew she must, but, when the crying stopped, she stopped too. She looked down. In her arms, the baby stared up at her with an expression of such serious contemplation on its face that Hisana frowned and glanced about for an explanation. Nothing was different save for the presence of two soul-reapers at the checkpoint, speaking together in low voices.

Hisana didn't know what that meant and she didn't care. All at once, it seemed a door had opened onto a way that she could be rid of the child.

Turning her back on the guards, she pulled the blanket across the baby's face. It remained quiet and motionless in her arms as she rearranged the bundle. The blanket, which was hand-embroidered with the baby's name and woven from fine cotton, was perhaps the most expensive item she possessed.

She broke into a cold sweat as she approached the checkpoint. What she was about to do was probably illegal and she wasn't yet certain of how punishments were meted out in this world, but she did know that she was afraid of the _shinigami._Like all the other souls she had met since coming here, she blamed them for her death in the human world and for all her subsequent misery. They, in turn, seemed to care little for the souls they had dropped into this world, though it was said that they kept meticulous records of the fate and whereabouts of each one.

Standing at the checkpoint in the twilight of a late summer evening, Hisana hoped they didn't notice she was trembling. She knew that you could die in this world. She'd seen a man killed in the street for the change in his purse. The body had lain there for a while, but, after three days, she'd heard tell that it had disintegrated into pale light. That seemed to be the way things were here, and you were meant to report all such things to the _shinigami._ "I need to register a death," she said. The two uniformed men glanced at each other. She wondered if they would challenge her, but, after a moment, one of them went into the checkpoint lodge and returned with papers. Hisana gave them her sister's name.

"How old was she?"

"Seven months."

"And how did she die?"

"She got sick," she said, hoping it was still possible to die that way.

"Is the body still intact?"

"No."

"Well, that's it," said the _shinigami, _folding up the papers: "We'll check her name against the records and corroborate her death in the next census. Anything else?"

"I need to visit Seventy-Eighth. Please."

"Purpose of visit?"

"I want to sell these blankets," she said, then she added: "I'll get a better price for them in Seventy-eighth." That, at least, was true. Seventy-eighth was a slightly better neighbourhood than her own.

"Granted," said the _shinigami, _and Hisana stepped through the checkpoint.

She felt a strange sense of liberation as she walked down the wide street, which quickly became busy with the evening's bustle. When she was certain she was lost in the crowd, she stopped, crouched down, and unwrapped the bundle she carried. The little girl's blue eyes stared up at her curiously.

"Maybe you understand. Just a little," she said: "You're going to be happy here."

She fashioned the blankets into a sling and lifted the baby onto her back.

Seventy-eighth was a large district, stretching from the edge of town down to the river. There were wide roads and a bustling market, labyrinthine alleys and, at its limit, a vast slum where people fashioned their own homes out of anything they could find. Hisana followed the road down to the river. It was dusk now and people were gathering around fires on the banks. The year was winding down to autumn and the nights were getting cooler.

She walked deeper and deeper into the district, until the moon was high. The baby had begun to cry again. Out of habit, Hisana spoke softly to the child, telling the little girl that there was no need to cry, that it would be alright, that they would be fine. Tonight though, those same words felt strange on her lips. She felt calm; not sad exactly. But she had been angry for so long: with the soul-reapers; with the citizens of Rukongai; with the world itself, and with the baby. Tonight, she didn't feel angry any more.

She forced herself to stop. This street wasn't busy, but it wasn't deserted either, and that was probably for the best. She set the child down in a doorway. It raised its hands as if it would touch her face, but she straightened and stepped back.

At once, the intensity of those cries increased. Hisana stared around. There was no-one near, but she was gripped by a sudden fear of discovery and, without another glance, she turned and ran.

The cries followed her down the street. How, she wondered, could so fierce a sound come from such a tiny thing? By the time she reached the riverside again, her eyes were full of tears.

The baby would find a family. It was too young to be burdened with memories of its own death and she had done the right thing by leaving it in a district that was better than her own. Her decision to report the girl's death meant that no-one would come looking to take her back to Seventy-ninth. Hisana would not see her again, but the child was free now, free to make this world her own in a way that Hisana would never be. Free to be who she wished to be. Not just one more victim of a senseless war.

The only part of her that she would take into the future was her name, 'Rukia,' embroidered onto the blanket in which she'd died.


	2. Chapter 2

**To Shadewolf7, Truantpony, ForbiddenME, Pinky357, Immortal Vows, Chellythemadhatter, Insomniatic95, Sallythedestroyerofworlds23, UNTensaZangetsu, XDark FangsX, Superlynx, Ichigoforeverlove, Ennaalemap, Makaykay15, Kaze05, Splash into Forever, War90, Yellowwomanonthebrink, Bakane, Night Flower, Hallmarktrinity, Tiffany Park, Snowcrystals, Neristhaed, Splitheart1120, VanillaTwilight4, Nightfur, Happykiller93, Haildance, Ani-mimi, Mysticalphoenix-avalon, Jennyrdr, Goranr and Firebirdever.**

**Also, special thanks to everyone who has faved and watched this story. THANK YOU!**

**It will continue straight on from this point, but the next part is called TRIAL BY WATER. I'll upload it now. It was better when fanfiction let me have links because it was much easier for people to click straight through to the next bit of the story. As it is, "Trial by Water" should shortly be appearing at the top of the list of my stories on my profile page.**


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